Holland Favors More Open Military Contacts with Ukraine

The defense ministries of Ukraine and the Kingdom of the Netherlands are to conduct about thirty various actions as part of their program of bilateral cooperation for the year 2000. Most important of them will be a visit to Kyiv of the Dutch Chief of Defense Staff, director of the National Defense College, chief of the peacekeeping units training school, and the medical corps chief of the Dutch armed forces. In addition, it is planned to train at Dutch expense Ukrainian officers in courses on defense against weapons of mass annihilation, life support of those gravely wounded in action, combat engineering reconnaissance, logistic support of UN operations, etc.

Lieutenant-Colonel Gerrit Timmer, military attach О in the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Ukraine, told The Day that, while earlier such courses were intended for all officers, including those of colonel grade, now attention has been concentrated on junior and warrant officers who thus acquire a real opportunity to upgrade their professional skills.

It is worth noting that the stay of only one person in Holland, including the cost of a round-trip ticket, lodging, boarding, and per diem, comes to over $15,000 US. Thus it is small wonder that in order to attend the courses one has to pass tough exams, the most important of them being command of English.

Similar training courses also exist for officers from other East European countries. For example, Holland is now training officers from Lithuania, Poland, Hungary, and Slovenia. However, unlike in the case of Ukraine, those countries pay for the training of their citizens.

As the military attach О noted, besides the bilateral cooperation program actions, Holland could help Ukraine print its so-called White Book. i.e., a document from which every taxpayer could gain information on the armed forces, including their development and prospects. Lt. Col. Timmer thinks, however, that the main obstacle to a more fruitful development of relations is the excessive secrecy of our military agency. For example, he states, the military attach О ’s corps still encounters a veil of secrecy shrouding the Ukrainian army reform plan for the period until 2005. “I gained the impression that either this plan does not exist or it is of a very low quality,” Timmer said, recalling that as long ago as December 13, 1996, Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma criticized this draft plan, only to approve it on December 28 of the same year.

“The Dutch Army keeps nothing in secret from its people or the international community. So it is perhaps for this reason that it only took eighteen months to make the transition to a professional army,” he pointed out.